Motivation--What Motivates You?

What motivates you?

There are many, many things in life that require little to no motivation or encouragement to complete. For instance, think back to when you were younger, getting ready to graduate from high school. You had the world at your fingertips! You could go to college, move out on your own, get a job, and basically do whatever you chose to do at that time!

So let’s say you chose to go to college, and then you graduate with your degree and get a job in your field. No one was there to tell you, “now make sure you go to class”, and “make sure you apply for jobs”, and “make sure you go to work”. You knew that if you didn’t do these things, you would not be getting satisfactory grades in order to graduate, to get that degree, to get that job. Then once you got that job, you knew you had to actually GO to work every day, or you’d be fired! These are some obvious, in-your-face type of consequences that no one really had to TELL you about! They were a “given”, right?

Welp, I think it’s safe to say that most people don’t think of their health and fitness as a “given”.  At times, the consequences of not taking care of ourselves are not immediately obvious! Most times we think, “well, I can eat this way now and I’ll make up for it later”.  Or “I’ll work out tomorrow.” Then the next thing you know, you haven’t worked out for months, and you eat like crap more often than not. This ultimately leads to steady weight gain, unhealthy habits, and a sedentary lifestyle, right? Things can really escalate quickly, to the point where some might just give up all together and think it’s too late to do anything about these unhealthy habits. That can’t be further from the truth!

Treating our health and wellness like our lives depended on it should be EXACTLY what we are doing as much as possible, because, let’s face it--our lives DO depend on it! Just because we cannot see the direct effect of these unhealthy habits immediately or very quickly, in the same way we might see the direct effect of say, not paying our bills on time, these effects are THERE!! They can be working against you as we speak if you don’t get them under control. Now, I’m not saying that means you must adopt ALL healthy habits NOW, or you’ll DIE!

No, creating healthy habits and sticking to them as much as possible, and creating balance in your life, is setting the stage for us to enjoy our time here on earth with our loved ones for as long as possible. There are so many uncertainties in life, and things OUT of our control, that focusing our efforts on what we CAN control, setting goals for ourselves, and educating ourselves on things related to nutrition, exercise, and longevity helps aide us in living our lives to their fullest, and never looking back on what might have been.